Conversations
by JealousOfTheMoon
Summary: To converse: to talk informally with another or others; to exchange views, opinions, etc., by talking; to maintain a familiar association. Four conversations between the Professor and each of his ex-refugees. Bookverse, I think.
1. Peter

Thanks _to all for the excellent feedback and never-ending patience. I promise HTKANMS, L&L, et al will be finished… right now college is devouring my time like a monster and as I type I've got a 13 page paper to wrap up. I will try to update every now and then until breaks and will hopefully be able to write like a fiend over those. _

Not sure _how long this will be. In my head I have four conversations between the Professor and each of the children planned out (and in my notebook I have two, including this one), but I don't know if I'll expand beyond that.  
_

This chapter _centers on the issue of Peter's location during VotDT (which, by the way, I did not come up with…that would be Lewis). None of this is mine. This one is mostly random and not earth-shattering--much like the Professor, I daresay.  
_

**Conversations** –by JotM

He gripped the telephone tightly, waiting for the operator to put the call through. His face was a comical mixture of anticipation and anxiety, the sort one gets when one _knows_ one is about to hear something agreeable and yet can't help but worry that one won't.

Finally, a familiar (but only barely, because the 'phone line distorted it) voice crackled out through the receiver. "Professor Kirke speaking," it stated politely from the other end.

The boy shook himself as from a daze and stumbled over his answer. He was speaking rather loudly into the mouthpiece, giving one the impression that he didn't do things of this sort very often. "Hallo—sir—I mean to say—this is Peter, Peter Pevensie, sir," the answer rushed out all at once in a breath as if he expected the other person to slam down the 'phone at any minute.

"Peter! Bless my soul! It _has_ been a while. You'd better stop stammering, boy, and tell me why you've rung in a coherent fashion." Here he muttered something about the state of schools today which Peter didn't quite catch but didn't ask him to clarify.

"It's just that—" He stopped and slowed himself down. "Well, you see, Mum and Dad are taking Su—that's Susan—to America and Ed and Lu—I mean Edmund and Lucy—have got to go off to Uncle Harold and Aunt Alberta's but Aunt Alberta's complaining something dreadful about finding space for myself and so there's nowhere to go, sir, except a boarding school, and it's very modern and Mum and Dad don't like it at all, sir," he paused briefly and was gratified to hear another muttered disparagement against the current schools. "I thought—I thought maybe you wouldn't mind if I came and studied with you, sir," he blurted. There. Hardest part was over.

"Certainly! And you needn't gasp in surprise so, it's not as if I could refuse. You know I'm not in the country anymore, so it shall be a rather wretched flat thing or whatever they call them these days—what _are_ things coming to, I wonder?—and…I say," his voice lowered suddenly. "Have you—how shall I say this, party line and all—_been_…since then?"

"We have—all of us," Peter's voice lowered as well, and at that moment anyone listening would have thought this a conversation between two friends with a deep and well-loved secret and a world of common ground rather than a learned Professor and an ex-refugee. "I can't go again—neither can Su—that's Susan, sir. _He_ said so." The excitement faded from his voice, turning to sadness tinged with resolve.

"I see," the Professor's voice sounded, if anything, sympathetic. "In that case, you'd better hurry off an pack so you can come as quickly as you can and tell me about it. Will a week from tomorrow do? Too soon? No? Very well. Have your Mum bring Susan along when she comes to dispatch you—I've a feeling I should talk to her…America, eh? Splendid! Or perhaps not. No matter. You'll have to break the bad news to Edmund and Lucy that there's no room for them, much as I wish it. Wretched, modern houses! All settled? Tell your mother I send my best. Good day."


	2. Susan

_This is almost a companion piece to _Gentle._ Some of my readers thought I moved things forward too quickly in that piece, so I thought I would clarify that Susan did not yet totally reject Narnia—she toyed with the idea I think perhaps that the bitterness towards Narnia in these stories was an initial stage born of confusion that she later was able at least to cover (she seems so carefree on the surface towards it based on the other childrens' descriptions). _

_In this bit, I think she mostly doesn't want to think about it because she doesn't want to be angry. _

_I've always imagined rather that she went off to America, fell in love with that sort of life, and decided shortly thereafter that she had reconciled with all that childhood nonsense and could talk about it easily—but honestly, it was nonsense, so why bother? _

_Any other input on this subject is appreciated._

**Conversations.2 – **_by JotM_

"So. America, then," Professor Kirke said more to himself than to the girl seated somewhat awkwardly across from him in the unimpressive sitting room of his cottage.

"Yes," she answered automatically, though it hadn't really been a question. "America," she repeated uselessly, then fell silent, wiping imaginary dust from the arm of her chair.

The Professor regarded her keenly for a while, and then said suddenly, "my mother went to America. She was a very sick woman; doctors recommended it for her health and all. Bit of a change, you know; better to get out of the house, keep her from memories and wishful thinking—time for her to think of the future, they said, _that_ would help her fight it. So…America."

"How…nice," Susan said with the absent nature of someone who doesn't know how to respond to a conversation and so has abstained from really becoming involved in it.

"Eh? Nice? It might have been _nice, _but in that case nice is rather useless when it didn't do her a lick of _good_!" He leaned forward suddenly, eyes gleaming. "Aslan took care of _that._ I don't believe anything or anyone but he could do her any good. See, and that's what mattered in the end—what was _good._"

Susan had a terrible feeling they weren't talking about his mother or America at all, and so she said nothing. Meanwhile, the Professor regarded her shrewdly. Perhaps something in her serene expression troubled him, for he began again in a gentler tone.

"My dear girl, as Son of Adam to Daughter of Eve I ask you to consider: whatever hurt you may be facing, whatever sickness you may have, the cure is not to be found anywhere in America. Do not look for what is nice before you have found what is good. Do you understand?"

A frown creased Susan's brow for a moment as she wavered, but she quickly came to a conclusion. "Thank you for your advice, Professor, but my health is as good as ever. Hello, Mum," she addressed the sweet-faced woman who had just entered the room, "Professor Kirke was just informing me of the various health precautions one should take when going on a long voyage. Professor, this is my Mum, _Helen_." The unnecessary emphasis on her mother's name—which he already knew—made him pause and then shake his head as Mrs. Pevensie turned and rambled to her eldest son about the rug she was going to send him (she had just been helping him get settled into his new room).

"So you do not want to understand, is that it?" Digory said, even though Susan was pretending to listen to her mother. "I was afraid of that."


	3. Edmund

_Part of JotM's great pre-summer FUF (Finish-Unfinished-Fics). I am trying to tie up all the loose-ended stories; there's too many of them scattered about on here for my comfort for me to justify starting anything new, and I've so many new ideas. But I am determined to be responsible and pull all these together first.  
_

_Takes place after VotDT, as quickly as it can be logically assumed that Edmund returned to school.  
_

**Conversations.3 – **_by JotM_

"Edmund! Edmund Pevensie!" a voice rang out over the school grounds. Edmund spun his head about, looking for the source. The tone was familiar, but so detached from its usual context that he was unable to pin it to a name. Much to his great surprise, he located the speaker standing under the great oak tree he'd taken to scrambling up when grief for the loss of his homeland threatened to engulf him. Just thinking about scrambling up that tree was making a lump rise in his throat. He blinked in surprise. Perhaps there was something to that psychology rot that his social sciences teacher was always spouting... He chuckled at the irony of that concession, for the person standing under the tree should have heartily contested almost everything that particular teacher tried to feed his students.

That thought brought him full circle; back to the man under the tree who had by now left the tree and was striding towards him in that way of walking the Prof had that was too purposeful to be dithering but too rambling to be really purposeful.

"Hullo, Edmund," the Professor said pleasantly. "I rather fancied I'd find you here. The Headmaster said you would be, actually. He consulted his schedules. I suppose he'd consider it a vast compliment to the modern method of organization that he knows where you'll be at a particular time, but I fancy most of these young lads don't follow the schedules all that much. Ha! Modern education... They don't have shame enough to refrain from using that particular misnomer. They asked me down here to give them some advice—I don't wear the name 'Professor' for nothing—though I doubt they'd have been so ready to have me if they knew I'd publicly denounced their wretched institutions a thousand times over and shall a thousand more with the greatest of pleasure."

"Do sit down," Edmund said politely, after trying desperately to contrive an answer to the previous statement and giving up. Digory Kirke sat down, and Edmund almost wished he hadn't. Beyond common courtesy, he was not entirely certain what to say to this chap and he wished he hadn't bypassed the "how-do-you-do"s so quickly.

Of course, it didn't help that the last time Ed had seen him, the traitor-turned-king had just undergone a change of soul in what was a matter of seconds for this world. He'd never quite known how he stood with the Prof after that. "He's not the sort to hold grudges—if he even noticed your ways before," Lucy tried to reassure him. He hadn't known how to tell her that that wasn't it at all. One glance at the Prof had shown him a man who's had the narrowest of narrow brushes with treachery himself and only been snatched out of it by the grace of the Lion. There had been something common between them, a shared understanding of mercy and redemption. At the same time, things were horribly confused. He'd gone from being a boy to a man (a king!) to a grubby schoolboy. It wasn't as though he could have walked up to the Prof and suggested they begin a society with some ridiculous name like PTT (People with Traitorous Tendencies). Had he done so, Professor would have begun one of his fabulous dissections of modern education and then Mrs. Macready would certainly have heard of it (she heard everything, he was convinced) and tan his hide later for insolence. Well, maybe she wouldn't have gone so far as to tan his hide, but he'd have been dusting several thousand historical artifacts. The thought made him grimace.

"You've been there again, haven't you?" the Professor said quite suddenly without any preamble. Edmund jumped with surprise and then flushed scarlet. To be interrupted in the middle of even mildly ridiculous thoughts always evoked feelings of embarrassment in him. It gave the impression that the interrupter could hear his thoughts—and he wasn't entirely sure the Prof couldn't. The man looked as though he very much wanted to laugh. Perhaps he was a good guesser.

"Oh—yes," he answered hastily. Why had he taken so long to answer the question? Then he blurted, quite suddenly, "He—he said I could never go back." He flushed red again as soon as the last part finished leaving his mouth. He'd not meant to say _that_—but the urge to say something more than a stammered yes had filled him, and the weight of never returning was pressing on his heart rather horribly. He hoped the Professor didn't chide him for complaining.

"Is that quite all?" the older man asked keenly.

"No," Edmund said slowly. "No, 'tisn't. He said we might—that we could find Him here." Even as he said the words, the weight of disappointment and confusion lifted a little, and something rushed through his heart—something swift and sharp. It felt a lot like hope. Maybe it was.

"Meaning," the Professor interjected, "that you most certainly _shall._" For half a moment Edmund feared the man might lecture him on logic, but Digory Kirke only looked at him a moment, as if searching for something, and gave a "hmm!" and a satisfied nod. Edmund wondered if the hope seeping through his heart was crawling across his expression as well.

Then a thought struck him, and the feeling in his chest surged with a stabbing sort of sweetness. "Sir, do you mean to say that... you've found him?" He almost choked on his own voice. It had become very hoarse all of a sudden. He looked around swiftly to make sure none of his classmates were 'round to hear.

Professor Kirke looked at him a moment. "I expect you'll be wanting me to tell you where to find him," he said finally. "That I won't—not directly, at any rate. I think you'd better talk to Peter about it. I will say that you won't find him by wardrobes and horns and paintings—or rings. Goodness knows I wished for something magical to whisk myself back!" He shook his head at some memory. "You see, He never told _me_ all that about His being here," the Professor went on. "He let poor Miss Plummer and myself muddle through it on our own. I suppose, though—no, it _was_ better that way. And I think, Edmund," he said, taking up his hat and walking-stick and rising to depart, "that on the whole, when it comes to being superior you'll find His ways usually are. Good-day to you." With that, he walked in his briskly aimless fashion past the towering oak into the golden light of the afternoon.


End file.
